


not respectable enough

by davesstrand



Category: South Park
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Light Angst, Loneliness, M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-05
Updated: 2021-02-05
Packaged: 2021-03-17 06:28:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,934
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29221008
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/davesstrand/pseuds/davesstrand
Summary: Stan almost immediately began to realize that his current position in life isn't quite right, which isn't without reason: his friends began to neglect his company, and even he became disgusted with himself.
Relationships: Kyle Broflovski/Stan Marsh
Comments: 2
Kudos: 11





	not respectable enough

_Pull yourself together and start dealing with all the shit in your life_.

Stan almost immediately began to realize that his current position in life isn't quite right, which isn't without reason: his friends began to neglect his company, and even he became disgusted with himself. He realized that all this is a consequence of his main inner belief, which is that he's just nothing than a piece of shit.

Stan was sure of it, because he had spent too much time trying to convince himself of it. No matter what he did, nothing changed at all.

His conviction was so strong that he had long ago stopped looking at everything that had happened to him from the angle of his analytical capabilities. Most of his free time from alcohol and clubs, he tried to find the hidden reserves of positive energy in himself and follow the path that would lead him to further movement, and his movements wouldn't be hindered by the real world around him and the possibility of interaction in it. After all, he acted as if he lived somewhere between reality and a fictional world.

His life had been completely derailed since he was fourteen. It was at the height of his growing up and forming his own self that he first realized that people were really huge pieces of shit. Just a moving pieces of meat, somehow sentient, but still mortal.

In those days, when his alcoholism and dope were getting worse, he was particularly aware of this gap. It had existed before, but now he felt it clearly.

He remembers the first time he got so carried away that he had to admit to himself that he needed help. But it all seemed pointless. Because he doesn't live with his parents, he broke up with Wendy a long time ago, and Kyle went to Jersey with his family. He's all alone in this slum, with just the same drunks around him, counting down the seconds until the next morning, wondering if they'll be lucky enough to make it to tomorrow. Who will come to him like this?

In his slum, Stan cleans up when his mother visits him. She comes in, shouts, smashes the dishes, and then leaves. Who else would he talk to? He's angry with his father, who has become even more isolated from the family. Shelly's engaged, she's gone off somewhere with some Arab-looking guy, and she definitely doesn't care about her little brother's self-imposed penance right now. In general, except for his mother, he sees and hears no one. It's been a long time since anyone checked him out. No one's even sure if he's dead or alive.

Kyle doesn't call him. They rarely even text each other. And if they do, it's maybe once a week. Or two. And that's fair, considering that they didn't say goodbye in the best possible way that time, because Stan got drunk and said something that supposed to sound like "goodbye", but actually sounded like "fuck you, traitor". But Kyle wasn't stupid, he should've gotten used to Stan's alcoholic tantrums and unfiltered speech. But maybe it was tough. And it obviously hurt, so it didn't really make sense to be mad at Kyle.

His ex-super-best-friend had gone to Jersey, and it just had to be accepted, and Stan can't take it like an average human being anymore. Once upon a time, he had his own tecnhique, based on a cold head and a steely memory, which, however, still betrays him. What can you do about it? As long as your body holds on, when your mind points where you're going to fall, and your brain aligns the lists of possible consequences, there's still a chance to survive a period of social instability and earn the illusion that you're not only alive, but also somehow in demand.

But when the technique started to fail, Stan started drinking. Again. But it wasn't anything like what he'd had when he was thirteen, fourteen, or even sixteen. All the shit that came with the transition age is long gone, and Stan prefers not to think about it for a very long time.

***

_"Stanley, eat something," his mother said, looking at him warily, but managing to remain completely unperturbed. "For your own good."_

_And he was only fifteen when he first encountered an absolute reluctance and aversion to food. At the time, he had thought that everything he ate now was both good and bad, both delicious and tasteless, and generally nauseating, but he didn't care. He just took what was on the table. His body needed to be nourished, recharged, that's all. It had nothing to do with what he wanted._

_"Eat, now," she said, trying to push a piece of food through his throat, which was clenched in disgust. "You know, I don't want to hurt you. Be a good boy, Stanley."_

_His mother stared at him without blinking as he desperately flexed his muscles just to get them into action. Still she said nothing. She didn't even smile. But when at last he managed to swallow everything that was on his plate, Sharon came out from behind the table, kissed her son on the forehead and patted him on the head. It was a little humiliating, embarrassing, but it wasn't the first time Stan had endured it._

_But the feeling of satiation didn't last long: Stan clutched at his throat and coughed, trying to keep from vomiting._

***

He tossed and turned in bed for a long time. He was shaking. The last time he'd shaken like this was when he'd nearly run into a pole in his drunken stupor. Since then, he's scared of driving a car even when he's sober, knowing his cynicism and misanthropy.

Doctors and a bunch of smart and not-so-smart people are advising him to forget about alcohol. It's in this direction that he now wants to start moving, but still he feels and even knows that he can't, because he's too weak for this. Kyle would've said otherwise, though.

He almost died when Kyle left, but at the same time, he couldn't blame him, because logically, Kyle had done the right thing. Unlike Stan, he still had his chances for the best, his goals, and his aspirations. And Stan didn't have that. The only thing he really had was beer and a vague idea of the frailty and terrible power that threw him beyond invisible boundaries. Back to the world where he would be lying on the ground, joyless, ridiculous, and worthless.

As he reaches for the bedside table with a trembling hand, aching for a drink, he listens to the vibration and looks at the phone screen that lights up, which is in a hurry to notify him of who's calling him at the moment...

Kyle.

He won't pick up the phone. He doesn't want to talk to Kyle when he's feeling like shit.

Or else he'll pick up the phone. He can still do it. He's remembered, though.

That's a little comforting. A little. Comforting.

"Stan?"

***

_"Gonna die soon, Ky. Nothing holds me in here anymore."_

_For Stan, death has always been something so alien that he simply doesn't understand that it's possible to feel any other fear about it, except, perhaps, fear for a man's sober mind._

_"I knew you were crazy lately, but I didn't even thought that..." Kyle was obviously outraged; Stan's grinning a bit._

_"Well, I have no right to ask of you any acceptation of it," Stan wasn't that cheerful about all of this, too. "I'm just not respectable enough, and I'll never be. I went crazy a long time ago, dude."_

_"And I was forced to leave. I don't know how I could help you," Kyle says. "If only I had a chance..."_

_Stan has no choice but to nod, even though Kyle or anyone else wasn't there. What else could he expect? He doesn't worry about anything. He just has nothing to lose. He wouldn't tell Kyle he was scared or anything like that. Because he won't understand all the bullshit, all the chaos that's going on in Stan's head._

_"Honestly, Stan, I'm lack of time," Kyle says, making it clear that the conversation is over by now. "We'll talk again, but another time. Just take care of yourself, man, huh?"_

_"Yeah, another time", Stan breathes._

_When Kyle hangs up, Stan presses his back against the wall and exhales loudly. He wanted to howl, he wanted to scream, but he wouldn't do any of that. Tears would be too much of a luxury for him. He hated himself for acting like a madman. And he would probably be happy to do something that would allow him to completely kill this feeling in himself._

***

Though, it's not comforting at all. Not. At. All. Comforting.

"How are you, Stan?" Kyle's worried voice gave him a glimmer of hope that things weren't so bad; for now, at least.

"I'm alive if I can still respond to my own name," Stan says, still shaking: he's still craving a drink, but now he wants to throw up, too. "What did you want?"

"You told me you're going to die."

"So, you wait for me to die? It's that what you want, eh, Kyle?"

"No, I just want you to listen to me, idiot."

Stan exhaled and coughed. It means " _go on, Kyle_."

"Well," Kyle said carefully, " we'll be in Denver in a week. I'm an hour away from you, Stan. An hour's fucking drive. Do you understand what this means?"

"It exactly means you're gonna be an hour away from me."

"Idiot. I was only going to say that, hm, in short, if you want to, well, we could... hang out? And please, stop drinking."

 _Hang out_. Kyle wanted to hang out with Stan, just like in old times. Nothing like this had happened to Stan for a decent amount of time.

This is quite a tempting offer, and it would be too unwise to refuse it, because it's a real opportunity to go out into the world. Perhaps this is even an excuse to clean up the house thoroughly, because Kyle's a being of the highest order, and this being requires careful handling, it can't exist in an environment where the laws of the universe are violated at least occasionally. And the laws of the universe, as ridiculous as it sounds, aren't written for people like Kyle.

You should give this boy credit, Kyle's still trying to get him out of that gap. So, he has no choice but to accept this offer. It's necessary, and that's all. And, really, Stan needs to stop drinking.

"Stan, say something."

"It's tempting, you know. Your Jewish ass once decided to leave me in an ungentlemanly way, and I won't let you get away with it so easily. Revenge will be bloody, Ky."

"Your cursing once forced my Jewish ass, as you put it, to leave you in an ungentlemanly way. But we need to accept that we both fucked up, dude."

"Yeah..." Stan said. "It was a total fuck up. So when you're going to move your butt and leave that shitty Jersey?"

And Kyle, as if nothing ever changed, began to retell everything that he had told before, and also started another monologue about how Stan was a brute who still didn't listen to him. It was a seance of unbearable lamentations. But the expected lamentations, and even a few necessary ones, because Stan hadn't had that luxury in a little over a year.

And it was worth it, really.


End file.
